The obvious thing would be to say that if you love Schumann and Brahms, you’ll enjoy these sonatas by Danish composer Niels Gade. You’ll also be entertained if you like your ear tweaked by occasional riffs suggestive of Beethoven or even Richard Strauss (yes, I know, Strauss essentially came after Gade, but listen to the opening theme of the Sonata No. 3, or to the melody in the Sonata No. 2 finale, and see what you think!). Although written over a period of more than 40 years and showing some (small) stylistic differences, these sonatas are all similarly vigorous, exuberant works that invite the utmost expressive energy (and not a little technical savvy!) from the two performers. In the long-distant days when I studied the violin my teachers never would have suggested such pieces for devoted study–why waste your time on anything but the real Brahms or Beethoven? But my reply would now be: why not give serious attention to Gade’s sonatas, all of which are very well-written for the violin (Gade was a violinist) and sound like they would be at least as much fun to play as Brahms or Beethoven?
These works have been rarely recorded, undeservedly so, and the performances here–by Christina Åstrand, who has made excellent recordings of concertos by Emil Hartmann (for this same label–type Q10077 in Search Reviews), Ligeti, and Nørgård (Q1964), and her pianist partner Per Salo (who also appears on Dacapo in Hartmann’s Piano Concerto)–match the vigor and exuberance inherent in Gade’s scores. The sound, especially for the violin, is somewhat close, and so is less vibrant and resonant as it might be. There is nothing new or unusual here–just some readily accessible, enlivening Classical/Romantic-style music that’s artfully, skillfully, sympathetically played. Again, if you enjoy Beethoven, Brahms, Mendelssohn, Schumann…
